Why buy the cow? Open Wi-Fi networks slow broadband adoption

By Meris Stansbury

October 18th, 2010

A report by analyst firm Mintel released this week claims that “Wi-Fi pirating” could be a main reason for the slow growth of broadband adoption over recent years, reports ReadWriteWeb. According to Mintel, “home internet services saw revenues increase by only 3% over the past five years”, but surely internet use itself has been on the rise. The firm found that 72% say that they have internet access at home, but only 56% report subscribing to a service at home. Where does the discrepancy come from?

“Home internet penetration barely moved from 2006 to 2009. The slow growth in the era of Facebook, Pandora and YouTube shows that people are accessing the internet from home through different methods, even if they haven’t paid for access themselves,” said Billy Hulkower, a senior analyst at Mintel. “Younger consumers appear especially likely to use a neighbor’s Wi-Fi signal instead of subscribing at home as they are more likely to know how to find and connect to their neighbors’ service.”

Beyond these “young consumer”, guess who else appear most likely to steal Wi-Fi – those households bringing in more than $75,000 a year…

Meris Stansbury

Meris Stansbury is the Editorial Director for both eSchool News and eCampus News, and was formerly the Managing Editor of eCampus News. Before working at eSchool Media, Meris worked as an assistant editor for The World and I, an online curriculum publication. She graduated from Kenyon College in 2006 with a BA in English, and enjoys spending way too much time either reading or cooking.